Collaborative Tools

• Sharing Knowledge: Media Wiki and other collaborative tools -- Matt Bellis

• Sharing Code: Distributed version control and social development -- Joe Blaylock

• Sharing Science: SSRL Remote Lab -- Thomas Eriksson• Sharing Results: Reading, writing, citing and sharing

HEP-- Travis Brooks• Collaboration tools: What is (or should be) centrally

supported at SLAC -- Tony Johnson• Favorite collaboration tools for science -- open mike

Collaboration tools: What is (or should be) centrally supported at SLAC

Tony Johnsontonyj@slac.stanford.edu

SLAC Scientific Computing WorkshopJune 2011

SLAC Web Tools• There was a time when SLAC led the world in collaborative web tools for science

– That time was 1991 – and back then it didn’t take very much

Collaborative tools at SLAC (20 years on)• Centrally Supported Tools– Confluence Wiki– JIRA web based issue tracking– Forum– (Share point)– Single sign-on service (crowd)

• What tools should be centrally supported (if any)?– Discussion

Confluence Wiki• Installed for use by Glast/Fermi in 2004• Rapidly adopted by collaboration

– Very mild learning curve• people just pick it up

– Became focal point for software development and later physics analysis discussion• Recently modified documents page provided

easy way to see what was happening in the collaboration

• Although installed initially for Fermi many other groups started using it– 2010 support migrated from Fermi to

computing division

Confluence Features• Powerful search capability– Search inside attached documents (pdf, word, ppt, …)

• Ability to watch spaces or individual pages– Allows you to be notified on changes

• wysiwyg editor or wiki markup editor• Wide range of macros for developing advanced

pages• All the other features you would expect (and many

more):– http://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence/full-features.jsp

Current usage• >100 spaces• Used by many experiments and groups

Creating a Confluence Space• Create a personal space– Login (with SLAC windows or unix password)– Click “Your Name” in top menu and select

• “Create Personal Space”

• Create a space for your group/project/experiment– Send e-mail to confluence-admin@slac.stanford.edu

• Name of space• Brief description of space• Who will be the administrator(s) of the space• Who should be able to view space (everyone, anyone logged in, specific

group of users)• Who should be able to edit the space• Whether “collaborators” without existing SLAC accounts should be able to

request access.

JIRA Issue Tracker• Web based issue tracker• Used at SLAC since about ~2000

– Adopted by Fermi in 2003 for tracking issues in software development– Centrally supported by computing division since 2010

• More than a bug tracker– Track issues and feature requests– Allow users/developers to comment on and discuss issues– Allows bugs/features to be associated with specific future release

• Lightweight project planning– Designed from outset as entirely web based product

• All administration can be done by web• Well suited for distributed development of software

– Very flexible permission/notification scheme– Custom workflows allow specialized use

• Tracking configuration control requests• Tracking mc simulation requests

JIRA screenshot

Using JIRA on your project

• E-mail apps-admin@slac.stanford.edu– Requested name, description, adminstrator(s) – Explain how you plan to use JIRA• JIRA has many configuration options so the more you

can describe anticipated use the faster your project can be set up

• Feel free to contact me to discuss more details

SLAC Forum• Discussion software such as hypernews has been very popular

on BaBar and other experiments• IT steering committee + Scientific computing steering

committee + Computing division have recently set up discussion forum software for use at SLAC– Initially restricted to discussion of computing

• Intended to encourage peer-2-peer discussion on topics of general interest• Mechanism for bi-directional communication with steering committee

• Available to anyone with a SLAC windows or unix login (or approved collaborators)– https://forum.slac.stanford.edu/

• You are encouraged to use it– At least to tell us how we can make it more useful

https://forum.slac.stanford.edu

Aside: Single sign-on• Confluence, JIRA and Forum all use a

common authentication mechanism– Based on crowd:

http://www.atlassian.com/software/crowd/– Allows users to login with unix or windows

id/password– Or allows “collaborators” to sign on without a SLAC

accounts• Provides a lightweight entirely web based mechanism for

authorizing collaborators

– http://jira.slac.stanford.edu/signup/

• Crowd can be used for your own web based applications– You can set up your own collaborator

groups

What tools should be centrally supported

– Conferencing tools?– Teleconferencing tools?– Developer tools?– Or should we encourage “cloud” based

collaboration tools?

Indico – conference planning software• Meeting planning software

– Developed at CERN– Suitable for simple

workshops or complex conferences

– Installed at many labs

• Useful to install at SLAC?– Or is there some way to

encourage US/world-wide installation all labs can share?

• Do we need more central support for teleconferencing tools?– Or remotely supported tools

fine• Webex• EVO• Readytalk• Google talk …

Developer tools

• Central support needed?

Or should we leap to “cloud” based tools

• Maybe the time for installing and supporting our own web tools is past– Perhaps we should encourage lab wide adoption

of cloud based solutions such as google docs• Google apps for business cost $50/employee• Would solve problem of working with microsoft

documents on Linux• Collaborative authorship of documents much easier

• Or is security too much of an issue?

Questions/comments/ideas?What are your favorite

collaborative tools?